Why is long-term follow-up important?
Because of the highly technical nature of this procedure, each surgeon performing this procedure will have their own recurrence/success rates. It is very important for each surgeon to evaluate their own success rate. This requires the surgeon to closely follow each patient and tumor treated with RFA for at least 6-12 months. Tumor must be individually measured at each time point to determine any change in size and appearance. A successfully ablated tumor will continue to reduce in size on susequent CT scans Each tumor is evaluated for risk factors. We have identified risk factors as size, location, and type of tumors. Those tumors smaller than 5.0 cm are more successfully treated, a 92% success rate. Tumors which are greater than 5.0 cm and/ or near major blood vessels have a higher rate of recurrence, and have a 88% success rate.
